Desires and Dreams Made of Grains of Falling Sand (36th Post)

Dear Reader, in the previous post I discussed my decision to stop using mood-altering drugs. The decision was prompted by a feeling deep within my heart. My heart and I had the desire to find a better way to live my life without using mood-altering drugs. My body could not help me with this decision since my body was addicted to the drug-induced sensations. My brain was also not much help, as it viewed drugs as a THE solution to the emotional pain hidden deep inside me. To the brain using drugs was a logical decision because they worked. 

Another factor impeded my brain’s ability to help me make a decision not to use drugs. From the TBIs, I had significant brain damage to the Executive Functions in the brain. Decision-making is one aspect of Executive Functions (EF). The odds were great if I had left the decision solely to my brain I would not have stopped using drugs. 

Think for a minute about how many decisions you make each day. Are the decisions complex,  simple, or a mix? Did you realize you just made a decision to read this sentence? Making decisions is as essential as breathing air. Decisions help us to form a past and to plan a future. Decision-making is not the only EF needed to create a future. The other EFs needed are planning, organizing, problem-solving, a sense of self, knowledge of your personal values, the ability to manage your emotions, initiate action, and manage your time. All these EFs contribute to making decisions and then allow you to act on the decisions. 

I had TBI which damaged my EFs. That meant I struggled with making decisions - any kind of decision- simple, complex, or mixed. It also meant many times I  acted on impulse rather than thinking the whole decision through. The damage also meant, not only could my EFs not help me, but their lack of them hindered, delayed….and delayed…and delayed, or diminished decisions. An additional challenge was the struggle to make a decision that led to neuro-fatigue. When that happened my brain would literally shut down. All would be “Quiet on the Western Front” - as the saying goes. Concerning the delays, for my whole life people would always say to me, “make a decision already or why are you taking so long to decide?”  Not knowing I had TBI, I had no answers for them, and also, I was screaming the same thing at myself, except silently, deep inside me. One of the tragedies of being challenged to make decisions is I  experienced many lost opportunities, some that would never be recovered. All I was left with, were broken dreams, feelings of despair, failure, and eternal regret. 

I am sure at some point in your life you have experienced some occasions of being so tired you could not think straight. That sometimes even happens to non-damaged brains. For damaged brains, they experience that problem every day. The neuro-fatigue results in feelings of hopelessness and frustration at not being able to accomplish what I had planned to accomplish each day. 

So, Dear Reader, where am I going with all this?  The answer leads us into the final chapter of my TBI life in high school. By senior year most, if not all, teens are beginning to create their future as young adults. They were defining the directions they wanted to take their life and who and what they wanted in their life. Creating and manifesting a future requires using your EF. Your EF”s actually make magic - they create something out of nothing. Or, as Deborah Harkness, the author states, “Magic is desires made real.” Teens have dreams, desires wishes; they want to not just think about but to do….to act upon and manifest into their world. That was not the case for me.

By senior year the only thing I realized about the future was this: I was haunted by a feeling of being directionless. I also had a constant image in my head that represented my life and the concept of my future. Here is the image: I see my hands cupped together. In my hands is a large mound of sand. The sand is streaming at a rapid rate through my fingers and falling to the earth only to become another mound of sand. No matter how hard I try to close my fingers and stop the stream, the sand continues to escape. Behind the image are intense feelings of panic, alarm, powerlessness, and deep sadness that I cannot grasp and control in my life. I cannot manifest the dreams and wishes inside me, at least not alone. I learned at work, school, and from the kindness of strangers, I can sometimes manifest my dreams and wishes IF someone else becomes my EF. 

On occasion, I have described to some of my friends the image of the sand. On my 40th birthday, one of my friends gave me the most amazing card. I did not know I had Anosognosia from the TBIs. That is the inability to accurately see one’s self-identity.  Apparently, she figured out I had misperceptions about my identity. She handed me the card and said - “I know how you see yourself, however, this is how I see you.” I opened the card. On the front of the card was a pair of hands cupped together. In the hands was a mound of precious gems - diamonds, emeralds, rubies, etc. The gems were slipping through the fingers and falling to the ground. As I stared at the card, my friend said, “this is how I see you - you are an amazing person, you are a warrior, protector, brilliant, and a good friend - you leave gems for anyone you encounter - I hope you can realize this one day.” I still have the card. Sometimes it makes me sad to see the card, and at other times I am encouraged.  I am grateful she shared her vision of me. I cannot, however, totally grasp her words as my past holds so many significant lost opportunities and broken dreams. 

What was my 40th birthday gift to myself? I decided I no longer wanted to hear from people with questions about why I was not manifesting my dreams. I decided I would just keep my dreams to myself and tell no one.  And so I did, until 2019 a the neuropsychologist determined I had undiagnosed TBI and explained to me why the sand kept running through my fingers.

But, Dear Reader, I am ahead of myself. Back to high school. One day, a friend and I were hanging out at her house. She helped me capture some of the grains of sand. She took that sand into her hands and molded the sand into a future for me. Then she handed me the future and told me what to do in order to live in this future sandcastle she had created for me.